where the heart is
by whizz
Summary: he'll always make the same mistakes, and he'll never learn from them -- Riku/Sora


**game; **Kingdom Hearts  
**pairing; **Riku/Sora  
**warnings; **shonen-ai, angst, curses  
**disclaimer; **I don't own Kingdom Hearts or the characters used. Like, are you kidding me?

&**&**&

He lives for the danger, the surging feeling of putting his life at stake that soars within his still-too-small-ribcage.

Riku's just a boy - he's still so young (but he's not _too _young; not too young to be understanding what's going on, not like Sora and Kairi who are convinced that the world is a rotating rush of pretty smiles and sugar-laced promises and papou fruits and _destiny_).

He sort of feels the need to protect them, though; not only because Sora's basically like a little brother to him, (and maybe more; maybe there's always been more, more things and feelings that could never be returned) just a babyface who's approaching the stadium of puberty and rebelling hormones with raging steps because of a burden - the _Key - _he's not even supposed to bear.

Not only because Kairi is so delicate and fragile and has been the main object of his more brotherly instincts since they were _this _tall-

Riku doesn't want them to see.

(large spots of color-drained black covering his bedroom floor, creatures with eyes that glow a mad yellow in the night emerging from the shadows)

He wants them to stay innocent and untainted for as long as is possible, running around on their childhood island laughing until they run out of breath, making sand castles until their fingers ache.

The silvret is only a year older; one mere _year _and the age gap might as well not have been there at all because there's always been just the three of them, together and joined and practically stuck to one another, but-

(but he can see, and they can't, and that makes all the difference in the world).

He's just a boy and he lives for the danger, and the adventurous journeys make his heart race and his blood pump with adrenaline that is yet to be stilled; there's always that slight twitch in his fingers, even now, waiting for another challenge to rise up.

Riku hopes that he'll never have to go back to the calm and almost serene atmosphere of Destiny Islands-

(yes, he sincerely hopes that, even though it means leaving all of his so-called friends and family behind

_he gets the feeling that he won't even miss them that much, except for Sora and Kairi, of course, but-_)

he's so much more suited for this.

&**&**&

Years pass, not-so-slowly-and-steadily.

Many battle scars and stories to be re-telled later, Riku sits on the bent papou tree of the island where he's been spending most of his life and he can't help but think that it used to feel so much bigger.

There's something missing and he knows it, the make-believe hole in his stomach that won't be whole again unless he can taste that addicting thrill on his tongue once more, the feeling of cold metal beneath his clasped fingers as he swings the Soul Eater and-

(god, he'll die if he wakes up one morning only to find that he's forgotten that feeling, the feeling of being so painfully _alive_).

&**&**&

Kairi's eyes are large and round and sad when they flicker to Riku, her peach lips pressed tightly together and he knows it hurts her to look at him like this, but he just can't _smile_, and he really wishes he could - for her sake, at least, but his lips twitch and the muscles around his mouth feels tense and not very convincing at all when he tries, so-

(he doesn't want to be a burden; he'd rather stay away from her sight completely than have her looking at him like that).

Sora is still the good-for-nothing he's always been, but chubby cheeks have been replaced with more defined and certainly more mature features, his eyes not quite so naïve anymore but instead tired and weary and _seen it all before._

He smiles, the almost-same sheepish grin that graces his lips and it's a good enough act to fool anybody except for Riku, of course, because he can clearly _see_-__

(he's always been good at that, hasn't he?)

He's almost completely sure that the sparkle in Sora's eyes is something akin to what Riku himself is directing at the younger boy (silently, of course, because no one could ever know) and it would all be so perfect if only it wasn't for the fact that Sora only looks at Kairi like that.

The silvret knows it's silly and stupid to wait for something that is never going to happen, but these feelings (these filthy, disgusting feelings) just won't go away.

And Kairi can only smile for both of them, those lips pointed upwards as some sort of forgiving wave that washes away his shame and regret and disgust because she can, on some level, understand the longing that rests within Riku's body.

"You need to leave", she says so surely, eyes shiny with perfectly shaped tears but voice steady, "you need to get away. You'll die if you stay here, you'll slowly fade away. I'd rather know that you are far away but happy than here but miserable, even if it'll hurt. Okay?"

And he wants to say _of course I'm happy here _and _of course I wouldn't leave you like that ever again_ and clasp her hand and smile; or, even say _okay, okay _and clasp her hand and smile; because she deserves it, she really does, but-

(he _can't_)

-instead, he rests his head on top of her bony shoulder; her body so small and delicate as if it'd break if you touched it, and she holds him and hushes him and bears the burden for both of them.

(she's so much stronger than others give her credit for)

"Don't tell him", he whispers, shaking, because this might change everything; and this time, he can't go back and expect everything to be the way it used to be no matter how much he tries to fit two broken pieces together, "don't tell him."

&**&**&

He leaves on a rainy night; it's not that uncommon on Destiny Islands with the tropical climate and all, but the rain drops fall so much harder that night, as if their intentions are to pierce right through the object they crash against-

(or maybe it's just his imagination).

Riku's bag is packed although it contains nothing of importance; nothing else matters right now, nothing but the daring challenges he just knows is waiting for him right around the corner-

(or right around this universe, to be more precise).

He can't help but feeling torn, though, even though the ache inside of him should be gone. It has something to do with sky-blue eyes and spiky hair, but he won't even go there.

Riku knows that there is no future for him on Destiny Islands - love or not.

(although 'love' is probably no way near what this feeling feeding his doubt is, since it takes two to love).

&**&**&

He doesn't know anything about Sora's reaction (of course he doesn't; newsflash is, he never stayed long enough to find out) but he guesses that the boy would be angry with him for not telling him anything.

Riku sometimes takes delight in imagining the many scenarios that involves Sora waking up the next day only to find out that Riku has left.

Mostly, it involves his sky-like eyes fixed upon Kairi's nervous gaze darting about the room and her lip sore from where she's been biting it all night.

He probably wouldn't get it at first, oblivious as always, not until Kairi repeatedly would drift off to some kind of absent-minded state or avoid questions about the silvret; and when he'd understand and rush over to Riku's house only to find it empty-

(completely empty; just like it's always been)

-he'd probably get mad at him. Really, really mad. Screaming threats and curses and _why didn't you tell me? I thought we were friends!_-sbut it would all fall upon deaf ears until he would finally stomp off, vowed to never speak to Riku again (not that he'd probably ever get the chance to) and erasing his once-best-friend from his memory completely.

Because, in the end, Riku really did bring him nothing but a lot of trouble; even after everything Sora went through to get him back.

(he's always been a burden, actually).

It's better off this way; Riku knows it, and he thinks that the most important people of his life, left on the islands all of their lives once rotated around knows it too.

&**&**&

He visits a lot of worlds.

Twilight Town and Pride Lands, Deep Jungle and Wonderland, Agrabah and Beast's Castle, Neverland and Hollow Bastion.

"There's no place like home", Aerith says with a kind smile as she prepares for dinner, her dress a frilly pink and her eyes warm and vivid.

Riku can do nothing but sheepishly return her smile with one of his own not-so-convincing ones, not really wanting to push his troubles on this lovely figure, too (like he has so many times before) by saying _I don't have a home._

But at night it eats him because he knows it's true, and Leon and Yuffie and Cloud and Tifa and Cid and Aerith and _everybody here _reminds him too much of that island that is just a dot in grey scale flickering in the back of his mind so he doesn't stay that long.

"Always on the run", he explains with a shrug and a half-smile that is there but not there when he's standing in the doorway, and Leon only watches him with hard steel-eyes when everybody else says their goodbyes.

"You'll have to face it someday", he says, voice low but firm, and he makes a pause, grey eyes weary before he adds, "the truth."

&**&**&

When the boy is standing before him once again, breathing and living and eyes so full of life, it's actually enough to knock the breath out of Riku's lungs because it's too surreal to be anything but unbelievable.

There's no tears this time, no_ 'I looked everywhere for you!'-_s because Sora's not a child anymore; his gangly limbs and the determined certainty mirrored in his gaze is enough to tell Riku that.

The silvret is tired; tired of everything. He's been travelling from world to world, hoping for something that will still his hunger, that will take the yet-to-be-fulfilled hole away, that will ease his worries and put an end to this _something _eating him from inside.

He's not found it. It's obvious in the way he sits slouched over in some dirty alley located in god-knows-where with only wild, scrawny cats as company, the rain pounding down furiously-

(almost as if its intentions are to pierce right through the object they crash against and, wait, has he had this dream before?)

Hope is something he gave up long ago, now there's just this endless void that doesn't go away and the traces of dried tears on his slumped-in cheeks, dirty silver locks cradled in rough hands.

He feels rather than hears the footsteps closing in, because the rainfall is nothing but ear-splitting, and when he catches a glimpse of something huge and bright yellow through wet bangs he is sure that it's nothing but another one of the nightmares constantly haunting him.

When a familiar, cold hand grasps his shoulder, however, he reconsiders his assumptions.

The sky-blue orbs looking back at him are the same as always, and yet not. They look tired, too.

"It's been a long journey", the boy whispers, lips tugging upwards despite the worn-out state the face looks like its in, "so how about going home?"

And Riku wants to cry-

(maybe he _is; _maybe it's tears and not rain running down his cheeks, or maybe this is all just a daydream, or maybe he's dying, but-)

-but, Sora is right _there_ and he's pulling the taller of the two to his feet, sun-kissed fingers lingering on the other's wrist as he rests his spike-covered head against Riku's ribcage and _breathes._

"I didn't find it", Riku finally chokes out after what feels like the fifth time of wetting his cracked lips and opening his mouth only to close it again. "I couldn't find what I was looking for."

"I know", Sora says through a sleepy smile, something wet slipping from the corners of his eyes (even if he's not a child; even if he isn't even supposed to be here in the first place), "and I think it's okay."

Despite the rain threatening to hammer right through the solid ground and breaking an ear-drum or two, Riku is in no hurry to move.

And maybe there really _is _no place like home.

(no place like wherever the person holding your heart is).

don't ask me what the hell this is - I'm not sure myself. all I know is that it started out as something compleeetely different but somehow ended in a true angsty soriku spirit! that doesn't completely suck, huh?


End file.
